Palmetto Proving Grounds

Kyle, Excellent points. I totally agree with your assessment. There are to many people with unrealistic expectations and their rants are counter productive. Give Coach Horn a reasonable time to change the situation that has long been Gamecock basketball. In my opinion, he has brought in more talent than we have had in years. It won't happen overnight but it is a process that will take several years to complete. With a little patience, I see a bright future.

I believe 5 years is a reasonable time. I agree that if 5 years pass and nothing has changed then at that time a change will need to be made. I am, however, optimistic that things will be much better at that time.

Roughly .500 record. 5 or 6 conference wins.

I was hoping for the NCAA, but that now seems unrealistic. I was hoping Muldrow and Jefferson would be more improved than they are. I was hoping Cook would be better than he is. I was hoping our sophomores would be more improved than they are. I was hoping our freshmen would be better than they are. Basically, I was hoping we would be more talented than we really are. I always have high hopes for the basketball team, and I am almost always disappointed. Been that way for 40 years.

I do think that, in time(I hate that term and what it implies), Coach Horn can build a good program that gets to the NCAA regularly, and competes for the SEC Championship often. My disappointment is that it will take longer than I want.

McGuire had the program rolling, and then USC made a mistake that ruined the basketball program: they got out of the ACC. That boneheaded move killed the basketball program and it has yet to recover. After 40 plus years of mediocrity, it is obviously very difficult to build a basketball program at USC. I think Horn has the best chance to do it of anyone we have had since the ACC days.

we have beat my preseason expectations. I was hoping for 5 total wins.

I agree. It is too much to expect freshmen Ellington to put the team on his back.

I also felt coming in that it was not in muldrow to do it. It is why I expected us to be about .500 overall and why I expected that horn would go into his last two years with a lot of heat on him.

I do not believe muldrow's failure to develop as a post player is poor coaching. He is a thin framed kid who mentally prefers and has preferred to shoot jump shots.

He has developed a little hook and back to the basket game, but it is inconsistent and it all has to fade away because he does not have enough mass to maintain his position or create space.

My preseason expectations were to be above .500 in conference play and a possible bubble team.

After that close loss to MSU, I thought that was a possibility but after what I have seen so far, I think this could still be an NIT team. MSU is not as good as everyone thought preseason so the "value" from that loss kind of went out the window after their rocky start.

Losing to Ohio State was expected but I didn't expect it to be that badly. The Furman loss is beyond frustrating.

Like many people, I prefer to see a strong post presence. I was hoping Muldrow would do a better job down low this season and sadly I was let down. Historically he hasn't been a strong scoring threat from the paint. I know he has been given the green light to shoot a 3 now and then but I find it discouraging to see your center (who is supposed to be a rebounder) throwing up 3s with nobody underneath.

Also, I am a little disappointed in the half-court offense. It doesn't look like we have many set plays (especially cuts to the basket). I realize that they are inexperienced at playing together but I would hope that some of that would have been taken care of by now. And I know that Horn's system is more of an up-tempo/score in transition kind of offense and I thought the Weave left when Odom did, but that doesn't appear to be the case. I also don't see us doing anything to combat a zone defense. It seems like we take a lot of contested jumpers when it comes to facing it. Usually we seem to stand at the top of the key letting the shot clock run down and take a contested jumper or drive to the basket against 3 or more players.

Ellington looks about where I figured he would. Still does a little too much coast-to-coast for me. Sometimes it seems like he tries to do too much and take a bunch of shots without even taking the time to slow down the offense and get some ball movement going.

But it isn't ALL doom and gloom. I really like where Jackson is in his development. It is good to see a player out there hustling every time he steps on the court like he does. Also, he seems to have a genuine passion for the game and is usually smiling. Good to see that. Harris has been contributing more than I expected as well.

I figured the SEC would be a little tougher this year but UT and UF are showing some cracks here lately. "Inconsistent" is the best term I can come up with at this time. They go out and play a good game against a quality opponent (UF against KSU, UT vs Pitt) but then go out and lose a blunder (Jacksonville State and Charlotte come to mind). I feel like we can steal a game or two away from them. Thankfully the West is down enough to get 3 or 4 there.

I think that we are NIT bound unless we see a drastic improvement underneath, better set plays, and figuring out a way to beat a zone defense.

If the cupboard wasn't bear when he arrived, it was awfully thin. He had five SEC caliber players his first year (Muldrow, Fredrick, Downey, Archie and Homes) and won the SEC east. He did something with those players that Dave Odom couldn't do in seven failed years as SC's Head Coach, have a winning record in the SEC and win his division. In year two, Horn lost three of those players, and only had two experienced SEC caliber players on the team (along with the two freshman he brought in - Jackson and Galloway). Also, upon arriving at SC, the academic situation for the basketball team was a disaster. He has since turned that around.

With the exception of Fogler's two years, we have been out of the basketball business for 35 years. It's takes time to build a program, and I am really sorry to see some of our fans have unrealistic and, to be blunt, idiotic expectations. Horn has brought in some good young talent who are going to be productive SEC players over their careers. However, they are not their yet on a consistent basis. Coach K can coach these same kids and the results would still be up and down. That is just the facts. It's good to finally have a coach who believes you can win at South Carolina and is working his butt off selling the program to talented high school players who other major programs want also.

Another strong recruiting class is on the way next year. Calm down people and let's be rational about our expectations. There is no one out there that we could have hired that would be doing a better job than what we are getting right now, both from building the progam, to putting a system in place, to improving the academic situation that the past coach left in a compete mess.

Other than the Furman loss, we are about on schedule. Beating Western Kentucky on the road and Clemson at home are two games that could have gone either way so I'd say we are on schedule or slightly ahead. I do expect them to improve as the young players get to play together a little longer.